What's the difference between billow and swell?

Billow


Definition:

  • (n.) A great wave or surge of the sea or other water, caused usually by violent wind.
  • (n.) A great wave or flood of anything.
  • (v. i.) To surge; to rise and roll in waves or surges; to undulate.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) On Wednesday, fires raged and smoke billowed from the central offices of the Guerrero state government.
  • (2) Though the specific billowing mitral leaflet syndrome almost certainly accounts for some of these auscultatory findings, a significant proportion may have early rheumatic heart disease.
  • (3) Updated at 10.40pm BST 9.12pm BST In this handout photo provided by the USGS, A satellite view shows smoke billowing from the Baiji North refinery complex on June 18, 2014 in Baiji, about 130 miles north of Baghdad.
  • (4) Flames could be seen through the scorched windows and billowing out of the roof of the sandstone building on the corner of Renfrew Street and Scott Street.
  • (5) In the Yellow Wall southern terrace the flags billowed.
  • (6) To assess the contributions of mitral leaflet billowing and exaggerated systolic mitral anular expansion to posterior motion of mitral leaflets recognized as mitral valve prolapse (MVP) by M-mode echocardiography, time-motion reconstructions of the anteroposterior displacement of points equally spaced along the anterior and posterior mitral leaflets were derived by computer-assisted analysis of 2-dimensional echocardiograms.
  • (7) Smoke billows into the air as a firefighter douses the fire at the Glasgow School of Art's Charles Rennie Mackintosh building.
  • (8) Billowing clouds suggest a cold, windy front moving across the desert, perhaps a haboob (intense dust storm).
  • (9) Podolski's first touch isn't great, taking him wide left at a tight angle, but the striker toks the ball between James' legs and sends the inside of the right-hand side netting billowing.
  • (10) The sound of explosions continued for several minutes, and black smoke billowed into the morning sky.
  • (11) Last decade, he was hired by the once-venerable Corcoran Gallery, Washington’s oldest private museum, to design a $200m expansion that featured his signature billowing titanium walls and a mix of traditional and curving galleries.
  • (12) It is Greece's summer ritual: the arrival of the island ferry, funnels billowing, horns blaring, gangplanks screeching as wide-eyed tourists prepare to disembark.
  • (13) He’s only got Mignolet to beat, and fires a low, hard shot which nine times out of ten would billow the net in its centre.
  • (14) The data are compatible with the hypothesis that the aging process is associated with decreased mobility of the mitral valve or annulus with lesser degrees of backward bowing or billowing of the leaflets during systole.
  • (15) My son came up from the cabin saying he could smell smoke as black clouds billowed out of the stern hull.
  • (16) Fighters streamed forward from close to the hospital and fanned out into a series of extensive apartment houses, one of them billowing black smoke.
  • (17) Billowing occurred on the first systolic frame in 8 of 28 Marfan-MVP patients, in whom posterior leaflet chordae arose abnormally from the posterior ventricular wall, and in no other subjects.
  • (18) Flames and billowing black smoke could still be seen long after the 73-car train had derailed, and a fire chief likened the charred scene to a war zone.
  • (19) Below him pipes of natural gas pump flames into the stack, lighting a fire that will burn day and night for 17 days to bake the bricks at 1080 degrees Celsius, sending the stench of sulphur into the air in billows of steam.
  • (20) To test the hypothesis that mitral valve prolapse may be due either to billowing of mitral leaflets into the left atrium or to dynamic expansion of the mitral anulus, mitral leaflet and annular dimensions and motion were measured by computer-assisted two-dimensional echocardiography in 35 normal adults and 48 subjects with auscultatory and M-mode echocardiographic evidence of mitral prolapse.

Swell


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To grow larger; to dilate or extend the exterior surface or dimensions, by matter added within, or by expansion of the inclosed substance; as, the legs swell in dropsy; a bruised part swells; a bladder swells by inflation.
  • (v. i.) To increase in size or extent by any addition; to increase in volume or force; as, a river swells, and overflows its banks; sounds swell or diminish.
  • (v. i.) To rise or be driven into waves or billows; to heave; as, in tempest, the ocean swells into waves.
  • (v. i.) To be puffed up or bloated; as, to swell with pride.
  • (v. i.) To be inflated; to belly; as, the sails swell.
  • (v. i.) To be turgid, bombastic, or extravagant; as, swelling words; a swelling style.
  • (v. i.) To protuberate; to bulge out; as, a cask swells in the middle.
  • (v. i.) To be elated; to rise arrogantly.
  • (v. i.) To grow upon the view; to become larger; to expand.
  • (v. i.) To become larger in amount; as, many little debts added, swell to a great amount.
  • (v. i.) To act in a pompous, ostentatious, or arrogant manner; to strut; to look big.
  • (v. t.) To increase the size, bulk, or dimensions of; to cause to rise, dilate, or increase; as, rains and dissolving snow swell the rivers in spring; immigration swells the population.
  • (v. t.) To aggravate; to heighten.
  • (v. t.) To raise to arrogance; to puff up; to inflate; as, to be swelled with pride or haughtiness.
  • (v. t.) To augment gradually in force or loudness, as the sound of a note.
  • (n.) The act of swelling.
  • (n.) Gradual increase.
  • (n.) Increase or augmentation in bulk; protuberance.
  • (n.) Increase in height; elevation; rise.
  • (n.) Increase of force, intensity, or volume of sound.
  • (n.) Increase of power in style, or of rhetorical force.
  • (n.) A gradual ascent, or rounded elevation, of land; as, an extensive plain abounding with little swells.
  • (n.) A wave, or billow; especially, a succession of large waves; the roll of the sea after a storm; as, a heavy swell sets into the harbor.
  • (n.) A gradual increase and decrease of the volume of sound; the crescendo and diminuendo combined; -- generally indicated by the sign.
  • (n.) A showy, dashing person; a dandy.
  • (a.) Having the characteristics of a person of rank and importance; showy; dandified; distinguished; as, a swell person; a swell neighborhood.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Furthermore echography revealed a collateral subperiosteal edema and a moderate thickening of extraocular muscles and bone periostitis, a massive swelling of muscles and bone defects in subperiosteal abscesses as well as encapsulated abscesses of the orbit and a concomitant retrobulbar neuritis in orbital cellulitis.
  • (2) Undaunted by the sickening swell of the ocean and wrapped up against the chilly wind, Straneo, of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, one of the world's leading oceanographic research centres, continues to take measurements from the waters as the long Arctic dusk falls.
  • (3) Axons emerge from proximal dendrites within 50 microns of the soma, and more rarely from the soma, in a tapering initial segment, commonly interrupted by one or two large swellings.
  • (4) It is a specific clinical picture with extensive soft tissue gas and swelling of the forearm.
  • (5) Psychiatric morbidity is further increased when adjuvant chemotherapy is used and when treatment results in persistent arm pain and swelling.
  • (6) Chromatolysis and swelling of the cell bodies of cut axons are more prolonged than after optic nerve section and resolve in more central regions of retina first.
  • (7) At 7 days axonal swellings were infrequently observed and the main structural feature was a reduction in myelin thickness in affected nerve fibers.
  • (8) In the companion paper, we quantitatively account for the observation that the ability of a solute to promote fusion depends on its permeability properties and the method of swelling.
  • (9) Admission venom levels also correlated with the extent of local swelling and the occurrence of tissue necrosis at the site of the bite.
  • (10) After 40 minutes of coronary occlusion and 20 minutes of reflow, significant cardiac weight gain occurred in association with characteristic alterations in the ischemic region, including widespread interstitial edema and focal vascular congestion and hemorrhage and swelling of cardiac muscle cells.
  • (11) The intensity of involvement varies in different arteries, localized swelling is of particular importance as a measure of atherosclerotic involvement.
  • (12) The DTH responses were induced by subcutaneous injection of allogeneic epidermal cells (ECs) and were assayed by footpad swelling.
  • (13) Adjunctive usage of elastic stockings and intermittent compression pneumatic boots in the perioperative period was helpful in controlling leg swelling and promoting wound healing.
  • (14) (1970) Endocrinology 87, 993--999), in stimulating both mitochondrial protein synthesis and swelling.
  • (15) Rapid swelling of the knee following a blow or twisting injury is considered a significant injury.
  • (16) Attachment appeared to involve a very close physical proximity of treponemes to the cultured cells; at the site of attachment, no changes such as swelling or indentation of the cultured cell surface were observed.
  • (17) The method is based upon osmotic swelling, sonication and centrifugation in sucrose.
  • (18) By contrast, all the semen samples that fertilized oocytes showed a 60% or higher reaction in the hypoosmotic swelling test, whereas the majority of the "infertile" semen samples showed less than 60% swelling.
  • (19) The changes included swelling, blunting, and flattening of epithelial foot processes, were accompanied by decreased stainability of glomerular anionic sites, and were largely reversed by subsequent perfusion with the polyanion heparin.
  • (20) After 3-5 days of side-arm traction, swelling had usually diminished sufficiently to allow the elbow to be safely hyperflexed to stabilize the fracture after elective closed reduction.